The Rise of High Fructose Corn Syrup

When chemists Richard Marshall and Earl Kooi started fiddling with cornstarch, the powder made

from the dense insides of corn kernels, their intention was to turn glucose, which is easily

produced from the starch, into fructose, which is sweeter. The idea wasn’t

that far-fetched. The two sugar molecules are cousins, both made from the same atomic parts

slightly rearranged. The duo’s experiment, which took place at the Corn Products Refining Company

in Argo, Ill., was a success. Marshall and Kooi discovered that

the bacterium Aeromonas hydrophila produced an enzyme that could reconfigure the components of glucose

from corn like so many Lego blocks. It was the first leap forward for a food industry